Now I AM worried! I have P4 1.8GHZ, 512, but GeForce2 cards. I'm told with FS9 that faster cards will make very little difference on FPS; it's CPU and RAM that matter. So that means a new system to get more than 3FPS in clouds. Crazy. I shan't start here - wrong forum - but I'm pretty peeved that every new version of MSFS seems to require a new system. Makes it pretty expensive software!Mark "Dark Moment" Beaumonthttp://www.swiremariners.com/newlogo.jpg

I'm not sure I quite follow the problem here with DXT3 so I'll just summarize my experiences in the hopes it'll be helpful.DXT compression is lossy and, as a result, you will get image degredation whether or not you use alpha. The degredation includes blockiness as well as color distortion especially along high-contrast edges. It only gets worse if you resave DXT images multiple times. Think of DXT as JPEG set at a low quality.I always keep my paint files in 24- or 32-bit uncompressed or lossless-compressed formats (.psp, .psd, .bmp). Alpha can be kept in a separate layer (in PSP or Photoshop), a separate file, or you can tell DXTbmp to save the whole thing in 32-bit (888-8) format (uncompressed bitmap with alpha). When I'm done, I'll make a DXT3 copy for distribution but I always save the original file.If you're starting from a DXT3, PSP can reduce some of the blockiness using the JPEG artifact filter. Essentially, it adds a noise component to the image to help hide the blocks. The color anomalies will probably have to be fixed manually. I usually just start fresh rather than from a DXT.Peter http://bfu.avsim.net/sigpics/PeterR.gifBFU Forums ModeratorRenegade/Seawolf Design Group (RSDG)[table border=2 cellpadding=0 cellspacing=1][tr][td][table border=0 cellpadding=8 cellspacing=0][tr][td bgcolor=#540000]http://bfu.avsim.net/sigpics/logo75t.gif[/td][td align="center" bgcolor=#FFFFF6]Bush Flying Unlimited"At home in the wild"Looking for adventure? Come join us! * [link:bfu.avsim.net|Web Site] * [link:www.cafepress.com/bfu,bfu2,bfu3,bfu4|BFU Store] * [link:bfu.avsim.net/join.htm]Join!][/td][/tr][/table][/td][/tr][/table